The Broken Spacebar
by Sirius I'm Serious
Summary: A humorous one-shot about Usagi and her brand new (yet broken) laptop. How will the girls react to this new development? Will Ami be able to fix it? Will Rei just break it more? And why is Usagi acting so strangely (well... stranger than normal)? Mild cursing and violence.


The Broken Spacebar

_Hey! I know I have other stories to update, but I figured that I would post this humorous piece so I could bring enjoyment to readers, and so I could have at least __one_ _story that was complete (heh heh)! Anyway, the summary says enough, and I dedicate this story to everyone who has ever ordered a laptop and has torn open the packaging only to sigh in disappointment when they see that one or more parts of their brand new laptop are broken, and that they'll have to spend hours of time and effort to replace it._

_Trust me. I feel your pain. _

_I also don't own Sailor Moon, but this plot is ALL MINE! BWA HA HA!_

_*cough cough* Anyway, on with the story._

There was a relative silence among the grounds of Hikawa Shrine. A peace that was suddenly and joltingly shattered by the all-too-familiar screech of Japan's greatest hero and future queen.

"Nooooo! What the— what's— oh noooo!" Usagi whined characteristically. Dramatically collapsing from her sitting position at the Senshi's study table and onto an overstuffed pillow, she let out a shrill huff and crossed her arms, much like a stubborn fiver-year-old.

"What is it NOW Usagi-baka?" Rei snapped, putting her math book down with unnecessary force, causing the table to shake and for several voices to make noises of protest as the sudden movement of their writing source caused their pencils to slide off their homework sheets. "Oh give me a break, you guys! That's why pencils have _erasers_!" Turning back towards her original target and ignoring the dark threats her companions muttered, she continued her onslaught. "Did you finally realize that you have no chance of actually passing math class, much less high school?"

"Now Rei-chan—" Ami began, but was soon cut off by Usagi's need to bicker with the hot-headed miko.

"Reeeiiii!" she whined as she shot back up, causing Ami to roll her eyes in complete hopelessness and defeat, and to return to computing her formulas, "that's not what I'm complaining about at all! And I do too have a chance of passing both math AND high school! Right girls?" Usagi looked at the group expectantly.

Sensing the chance to tease their leader, both Makoto and Minako gave each other slight winks before putting on identical contemplative faces.

"Well…" Makoto drawled, tapping her chin with her pencil.

"Now that you mention it…" the latter considered, drumming her fingers on the tabletop.

"Ugh! I hate you guys!" Usagi mockingly complained, covering her face with her hands as she giggled at her friends' antics.

As the two teasers laughed, Ami looked up from her textbook, resigning to the fact that (at least for now) she would not be able to get any studying done while her friends refused to act their age. "Anyway, Usagi-chan… what exactly _were_ you complaining about?"

"Yeah, baka? What?" Rei jeered, poking her friend with the eraser end of her pencil.

After whipping her hands out from over her face and shooting a glare towards Rei, the blonde told her tale of woe, "My spacebar… on my _brand new_ laptop… it's BROKEN!" After her shrill remark, (causing all of her friends to wince slightly) she began sobbing in earnest, recovering her face with her hands.

"Really? THAT'S why you had to go to DEFCON 1?" the miko mocked, leaning her head towards her now distraught friend's left shoulder to get a good view at the keypad of said laptop.

"What exactly is wrong with it?" Ami inquired, walking over to her friend's right side, sitting down, and peering at the keypad critically.

"It's… it's…" she was unable to continue, however, as her sobbing overcame her, causing her to become incoherent with emotion.

As Rei rolled her eyes at her friend's over-the-top behavior, Ami reached out and placed her forefinger lightly on the key in question. Without even pressing down, the spacebar began to zip across the screen, creating an indefinite amount of spaces in the word document. Even after quickly removing her finger, Ami noticed that the cursor had already moved down to the next line.

"Whoa. That's weird." Rei looked at her serious friend with a confused expression. "How was it able to make that many spaces _that_ fast?"

"Yes, it's very odd, and I didn't even press it. Hmm…" the computer genius pondered the situation for a moment, before noticing an odd characteristic. "Here's the problem," she pointed to the key, and even Usagi stopped sobbing and uncovered her eyes enough to look at where Ami was indicating. "The spacebar is warped."

"Warped how?" Makoto asked, walking over behind Ami and peered over her shoulder, glad for the distraction from studying.

Minako, catching on, ran over behind Rei and looked expectantly over her shoulder (although she really couldn't care less).

"The ends seem to be higher than the middle. It seems to be an almost parabolic shape." As she explained this, she lightly traced her finger across the key, noticing how her finger dipped then rose across it, also causing the cursor to scroll across the screen at a great speed.

"Only our Ami-chan could bring math into a broken computer situation," Makoto mocked, patting her on the shoulder, causing her to blush slightly and mutter in mortification.

"Anyway, can you fix it?" Rei looked over at the timid girl, attempting to save her from her embarrassment.

Clearing her throat, Ami nodded. Looking around the room, she finally settled her gaze on Rei and asked, "Rei-chan, where do you keep your tools?"

Chuckling, the miko stood up and walked over to Ami's right side, offering her a hand. "It's in the shed outside. I'll take you there."

Nodding seriously, the blue-haired girl took the preferred hand and allowed her friend to help pull her up. Once the two disappeared behind the paper door leading to the rest of the house, Minako and Makoto sidled up on either side of their emotional friend, intending to strike up a conversation.

"Soooo… how'd ya break it?" Minako teased, pinching her friend's cheek.

"_I_ didn't. It was like this just now!" Usagi gestured dramatically and slapped her energetic friend's hand away from her now reddening face. "My parents gave it to me just this morning for getting a B on my last math test, and we set it all up, installed everything, and I was going to use it to study…" seeing her friends' raised eyebrows, she admitted, "ok, to _surf the web_ while we were here, and when I opened up a word document to fool Ami-chan into thinking I was working… well, you girls know the rest."

"Seriously? Your parents gave you a _laptop_ for getting a mediocre score on a math test? The only thing my parents do is ground me for the weekend for _failing_ tests." Minako put her hand to her head dramatically.

"Yet you always seem to have an open schedule on said weekends," Makoto muttered, grinning.

"Are you implying that I _fail_ tests _that_ often?"

"I refuse to answer that question on the grounds that I may be harmed bodily upon answering truthfully."

"ANYWAY," Minako plowed on as Makoto giggled, "you're saying that the laptop just came with the defect?"

"I guess…" Usagi mumbled, chewing forlornly on her eraser.

"Well then, you should call the company and demand a new one!" Minako declared, standing up and pumping her right fist into the air.

"But that means I have to _call_ the office and arrange for shipping both _for_ the new laptop _and_ my old one," the girl whined. "Too… much… effort…"

As both Minako and Makoto rolled their eyes simultaneously, Usagi added quietly, "And… well…"

Suddenly, the paper door slid open, revealing a grinning Rei holding a rusty toolbox in her unoccupied hand, along with a serious-faced Ami trailing slightly behind.

"One fixed-up laptop, coming right up!" the miko shouted walking over to Usagi's right side and plopping the toolkit on the table in front of her, dangerously close to her laptop. She sat on Minako's left, smirking at her sensitive friend's scandalized face.

Ami followed, sitting down behind the toolbox (with Makoto quickly scuttling out of the way, realizing her friend was now in 'computer mode' which was a world in which anything but the computer was completely ignored).

"Alright." Ami opened up the kit and sifted through for a bit until she found what she was looking for. Taking up a flathead screwdriver, she carefully wedged it underneath the right side of the spacebar, pushing it up until she heard a slight 'pop'. Grinning, she repeated this on the left side, with the key becoming loose once she was finished. Ever so carefully, she took each side of the key and lifted it up to reveal the circuitry underneath.

"It… looks like it was smashed." Ami glanced up at the owner. "And it came like this? You said it was 'brand new', right?"

Usagi nodded slowly, sniffling.

"Okay…" The computer expert went to work, carefully selecting tools in order to work on the practically destroyed circuitry within. For a few minutes, the only sound was the occasional sniffle from Usagi, and the 'clinking' of tools in Ami's hands.

Finally, after what seemed like an eternity to the girls (yet in reality was no more than five minutes), Ami replaced the now restored key, clicking it back into place with a satisfied grin. Replacing the tools and closing the lid to the kit, she sat back and exclaimed, "Try it now, Usagi-chan. It should be running smoothly."

"'Kay!" The excited girl leaned forward, rested her finger on the spacebar, and watched the screen. Nothing. No zooming cursors, no infinite spaces. It was safe to say that the spacebar was now in perfect working order.

"Yay! Ami-chan's a genius!" Usagi turned towards said genius and hugged her tightly, receiving a startled gasp in reply. "Thank you, thank you, thank you!"

"Y-you're welcome, U-Usagi-chan," she muttered, silently mouthing the words 'Help me' to her friends.

"Alright, Usagi-chan, geniuses need more oxygen intake for their superhuman brains to function properly. Let her go." Makoto pried off the ecstatic princess and smirked at Ami, who mouthed 'Thank you.'

"Glad THAT'S over with," Rei chuckled, standing up and walking over to the toolbox. Gripping the handle, she stopped when she heard her friend yell.

"WAIT! Rei, you can't take the toolbox away yet! What if something else's broken?" Usagi looked up at her with puppy-dog eyes, causing the hot-tempered friend to bite back her cruel remark.

Makoto compensated, although most likely, not as harshly, "What else would be broken? They wouldn't be able to _sell_ a laptop that was in too poor a condition, right?"

"Well… I dunno…" Usagi trailed off with a strange glint in her eye.

Everyone seemed to notice except for Ami, who was busy scanning over the rest of the keypad. "Nothing else seems to be wrong, but one can never be too careful. Leave the toolkit here, please Rei-chan. She can test out the rest of the keypad while we get back to studying."

There was a silence at these words, everyone forgetting exactly what they had been doing in the first place. When no one responded, Ami huffed slightly and stood up, taking the kit from Rei's unresisting hands and placing it back down gently on the table. "Honestly. Studying is good for you girls. You do want to receive good marks, correct?"

"Uh…"

"Good. It's settled. Let's get back to it." Ami went back over to her original seat, took up her pencil, and began furiously scribbling some long and cryptic formula, like she had been doing it all of her life and had never been interrupted.

There was another long silence. The spell was quickly broken when Ami cleared her throat menacingly, striking fear into the hearts of the brave Senshi. Minako, Makoto, and Rei quickly resumed their original positions, taking up their pencils and reopening their textbooks, which seemed to have closed during the previous chaos.

Usagi sighed, looked at her math textbook opened in front of her, and began to type out definitions of and uses for formulas. After about twenty minutes of this, the princess decided now was as good a time as any to implement her plan. Opening the toolkit, she fiddled with the tools inside, quickly pulling out the hammer and placing it discretely under her pillow.

As she continued to fiddle with the kit, Rei looked up, red in the face. "Do you _mind_ Usagi-baka? Some of us actually want to be able to function beyond a kindergarten math level."

"Ha. Ha. You are sooo funny Rei. I forgot to laugh."

"You baka! You can't even joke in an intellectual way! You _just_ laughed!"

Do. You. Two. _Mind_?" Ami muttered darkly, immensely irritated at the fact that her study time was being interrupted yet again. At this rate, she would only be ahead by _seven_ chapters, and she only felt comfortable when she was ahead by at least ten.

Usagi merely stuck her tongue out at Rei, and slowly closed the lid, grinning to herself. "Actually," she began, causing Rei to roll her eyes and for Ami to actually look up at her, "I think you can take the tool box back, Ami-chan. I think the rest of the keys are fine."

"I'll take it back, Usagi," Rei responded, quickly standing up and snatching up the toolbox. '_Anything to avoid homework,_' she thought darkly.

"Well… let Ami-chan come with you," Usagi said somewhat desperately; she needed Ami out of the room for this to work.

"Why?" Rei asked, looking quizzically at her friend.

"'Cause… she…" Unable to think of a reason, Usagi quickly looked around at what was available. Spotting a jug of juice, she grinned slightly evilly before standing up with a flourish, and knocking the jug towards her scientific friend, causing its contents to spill all over her outfit.

"Usagi-chan!" Ami yelled, finally losing her temper (which, to Usagi's credit, is EXTREMELY hard to do), "this is my third favorite skirt!"

"Well, at least it's not your first. Heh, heh." Usagi chuckled nervously.

Minako laughed. "That's right, Usagi. You already took care of _that_ one, didn't you?" Ignoring the other girl's spluttering, she continued, "You _somehow_ managed to spill spaghetti sauce and chocolate cake on her favorite skirt… on her _birthday_ I might add!"

"Well…"

"Can I use your bathroom, Rei-chan?" Ami asked irritably, standing up in the puddle of juice.

"Sure. You know where it is, right Ami-chan?" The miko looked torn between yelling at Usagi for ruining her carpet (again) and being afraid of Ami.

"Yes. Thank you." With a curt nod, Ami disappeared behind the sliding door.

All three girls descended upon Usagi, each equally upset. "Baka! What did you do _that_ for? You aren't _that_ much of a klutz!" Rei yelled, incensed. "And look what you did to my floor!"

Usagi pouted. "Rei, I can explain—"

But Minako wouldn't let her. "Usagi, we know you're planning something. You had a weird look in your eye when Mako-chan said how the laptop couldn't be in a _terrible_ condition, and then you purposefully spilled juice all over Ami-chan's second favorite—"

"Third," Rei corrected her.

"_Third_," Minako corrected herself, glaring at Rei impatiently, who merely smirked in response, "favorite skirt. The point being, what exactly is going on in that devious little mind of yours?"

"Yeah, Usagi-chan," Makoto tacked on, "what's up?"

Usagi waited until the girls had concluded their rant before daring to speak again. "Well, you see… it's almost the end of the year, and finals are coming up—"

"_Really_?" Rei asked sarcastically, raising her eyebrows in mock interest.

"_Yes really_, Rei, don't mock me. Your school doesn't even have the same schedule as ours. Ha!" The blonde stuck her tongue out at her bickering partner, daring her to respond.

"Even so, _all_ schools are ending soon, so we _all_ have finals to take, baka!" She in turn stuck out her tongue, acknowledging her defeat over Usagi with basic logic.

"Guys, focus." Makoto lightly slapped each girl on the cheek, causing them to jump slightly, as if realizing for the first time that they weren't the only ones in the room. "Finish your story, Usagi-chan."

"Gladly." With a raised eyebrow at Rei, she continued, "Well, since finals are coming, Ami-chan's been making us study overtime, and my brain couldn't take much more of the extra studying."

Sensing Rei was about to make a smart comment (most likely about her friend's brain not being able to take in _any_ studying without spontaneously combusting), Minako quickly covered her mouth with her hand, knowing she would probably regret her action later. "So…? Then what?"

"Well… I decided that I should… _distract_ Ami-chan somehow. But I couldn't think of _how_. But then," she smirked, "Mama and Papa got me a new laptop, and they warned me to be careful, because laptops were very sensitive, but that they trusted me enough to let me own one, on the grounds that I would _swear_ to carry it with two hands at all times, and that I would only use it for schoolwork."

"Rules of which you broke simultaneously, right?" Makoto teased, giggling slightly as she saw Minako snatch her hand away from Rei's face, shaking it back and forth as if she had been burned.

"Y-you BIT me!" the blonde exclaimed in a scandalized voice, holding onto her injured hand with her free one. "You better not have rabies, Rei!"

Rei glared at her, merely growling, "Don't touch me again." She then smirked, to let the blonde know she wasn't truly angry.

"ANYWAY," Usagi continued, raising her eyebrows at her two friends' antics, "yes, Mako-chan, I _may_ have already broken both rules, but that's not the point. The point is that their warnings gave me an idea. Since Ami-chan's so interested in computers, and she would _love_ an excuse to fix them, I figured… maybe…"

"Don't tell me," Makoto started, slightly shocked (which, with her element, was difficult to be), "you actually _broke_ the spacebar so that Ami-chan could waste time 'fixing' it?"

Usagi smiled guilty and quickly nodded her head twice. "Yes. That's the basic idea."

"You're even more of a baka than I thought, baka" Rei muttered, not unsurprised by her friend's idiotic behavior.

"Seriously, Usagi? What if you broke it beyond even Ami-chan's ability to repair?" Minako wondered, looking at her friend seriously to make sure that nothing had also been broken in her head.

"_Girls_! I'm not _that_ destructive!"

"Wanna bet?"

"I'll ignore that. So," Usagi smiled sheepishly at each girl in turn, "the reason I spilled juice all over Ami-chan's skirt is so I could get her out of the room so I could—" She whipped out the hammer from under her pillow. "'find' another 'broken' key for her to fix."

"So _that's_ what you were doing with that toolkit?" Rei deduced in a slightly awed voice.

"Yep. So, who's with me?"

The three girls looked around at each other uncertainly, uncomfortably aware of Usagi's eager grin focused upon them.

"Well, it would be nice to study less…" Makoto thought out loud. "Alright, I'm in."

"Hmmm… Me too!" Minako cheered, giving her Sailor V sign.

They all looked at the last reluctant member of their little group, who was watching them warily. Finally, she growled, "Damn peer pressure. _Fine_. But if you get anything on my floor one more time, I'll aim my Mars Flame Sniper right at your laptop and make sure that Ami-chan will have _no_ chance of fixing it."

"Yeesh, scary Rei…" Usagi muttered, crossing her heart as she swore that no stainable substance would ever tarnish the sacred halls of Hikawa Shrine. "Now quick, which key should I break?"

"How about the 'Enter' key; people use that one _all_ the time," Makoto advised wisely, pointing to said key.

"No, no. With the way Usagi types, I think the 'Backspace' button will be the most worthwhile key."

"Reeeiiii…"

"Oh, oh, how about the 'Period' key? You need that to write sentences, Usagi." Minako exclaimed, taking up the hammer excitedly.

"How about the 'End' key," a cool voice said from behind them, "since that's what your lives will being doing in a few seconds?"

The girls' reactions were as dramatic as they were varied. Minako screamed and dropped the hammer (luckily onto the table next to the laptop), while Rei used a few choice words not suitable for the rating this story is given. Makoto dropped her head onto the table and groaned, and Usagi slowly turned around and flinched at the icy look she was receiving. "H-hey, Ami-chan. W-we just saw s-several broken keys and thought—"

"Let's break them even more?" If looks could kill, Usagi would be dead again.

"Uh… how much did you hear?" Makoto asked in a muffled voice, still too guilt-ridden to look up at her friend.

"Enough."

"Well, you should know that Usagi _forced_ us to go along with her plan." Minako took up the hammer and placed it into her stunned friend's hands. "She made it a _royal decree_!"

"Traitor!"

"No, Minako's right. None of us wanted to go along with it, but she threatened us with royal punishment if we didn't comply," Rei said seriously, trying to mask any signs that she was lying through her teeth. '_Well,_' she thought to herself, '_I _was_ sort of forced…_'

"And what was that punishment Rei-chan? A Mars Flame Sniper aimed at your head? Damaging you so terribly that even _I_ wouldn't be able to fix it?" Ami raised an eyebrow at them, as if daring them to continue their fabricated stories.

"Damn."

"Well, since you're all so _interested_ in the basics of computer technology, why don't I lend you one of my _favorite_ books on the subject?" Seeing her friends' horrified faces (for Makoto had snapped her head up at the mention of 'books'), she continued with a slightly malevolent light in her eyes, "It's only about 890 pages, and it really gives you a whole new insight into the inner workings of a computer. I could quiz you all on five chapters a week, just to make sure you retained it all. Oh, and that would be in addition to our current 'overtime studies'."

Silence reigned supreme as the genius' words were absorbed by her friends. Each girl looked at the others in turn, and, right as they were about to admit defeat, their leader spoke.

"Actually, I have a laptop, not a computer."

"…"

And, after the typhoon of water surged through the shrine, soaking everything and everyone within it, it was safe to say that no one would be angering Sailor Mercury anytime soon.

Oh and Rei's carpet… stains would be the least of her worries.

_Well, there you have it. I have no plausible explanation as to how Ami snuck up on the girls without alerting any of them to her presence… especially with Rei's psychic prowess… hmmm… but hey, humor fics don't have to make sense! That's what makes them humorous!_


End file.
